Seigo Nakano

Seigo Nakano (12 February 1886-27 October 1943) was the founder of the fascist Tohokai party of Japan.

Biography
Seigo Nakano was born on 12 February 1886, and he developed ideas about the completion of the Meiji Restoration and the rebirth of Japan. He wanted to blend the samurai ethic, neo-Confucianism, and populist nationalism modeled after fascism in Europe, and he saw Saigo Takamori as embodying the spirit of the restoration. In December 1937, he had a personal audience with the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, and he met with Adolf Hitler and his foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop the next month.

In January 1939, Nakano spoke about the need for a totalitarian Japan, and he led his fascist Tohokai faction in a war of words against the rival Kodoha party before the defeats at the Coral Sea and Midway in 1942. Although he was a nationalist, Nakano opposed Japan's unrealistic goal of conquering all of Asia, and he was in favor of a peace with the Allied Powers, opposing the unnecessary losses suffered by the Japanese military. In October 1943, his party was disbanded by Prime Minister Hideki Tojo after its members were accused of plotting against the government, and Nakano was censored. He committed seppuku on 27 October 1943.